Manifest Customer Destiny

February 10, 2014 •Comments Off on Manifest Customer Destiny

Late last year I stumbled upon a thought-provoking ebook from Michael Schrage that has upended how I look at business innovation.

Michael Schrage is a research fellow at the MIT Sloan School Center for Digital Business. His ebook attempts to redefine how companies should approach innovation by focusing on this question: Who do you want your customers to become?

He refers to this question as THE ASK and in the ebook, Who Do you Want your Customers to Become?, he makes the case for why this question is important to focus on because it “offers a lightweight but high-impact methodology for aligning strategic, marketing, brand, and innovation leadership around customer transformation.”

Look at any successful innovation from the Amana Microwave Oven to the Ford Model T to Microsoft Windows XP to the Southwest Airlines business model. These innovations didn’t just transform the companies that introduced them; they transformed the lives of customers who use them.

Schrage writes, “Customers don’t just adopt innovations; they alter them, adapt to them, and are changed by them. Like economic Charles Darwins, successful innovators strive to observe and understand how their customers evolve.”

The key idea behind Schrage’s thinking is: “Successful innovators don’t just ask customers and clients to do something different; they ask them to become someone different.”

Brand Autopsy Newsletter

Get monthly nuggets of marketing know-how

About

I believe passion and a sense of purpose fuel successful marketing messages, whether delivered via a product, a service, an experience, or a presentation. My background includes a decade working deep inside the marketing departments at Starbucks Coffee and Whole Foods Market.